Trajectories of cortical surface area and cortical volume maturation in normal brain development

Genetic factors and socioeconomic status (SES) inequalities play a large role in educational attainment, and both have been associated with variations in brain structure and cognition. However, genetics and SES are correlated, and no prior study has assessed their neural associations independently. Here we used a polygenic score for educational attainment (EduYears-PGS), as well as SES, in a longitudinal study of 551 adolescents to tease apart genetic and environmental associations with brain development and cognition. Subjects received a structural MRI scan at ages 14 and 19. At both time points, they performed three working memory (WM) tasks. SES and EduYears-PGS were correlated (r= 0.27) and had both common and independent associations with brain structure and cognition. Specifically, lower SES was related to less total cortical surface area and lower WM. EduYears-PGS was also related to total cortical surface area, but in addition had a regional association with surface area in the right parietal lobe, a region related to nonverbal cognitive functions, including mathematics, spatial cognition, and WM. SES, but not EduYears-PGS, was related to a change in total cortical surface area from age 14 to 19. This study demonstrates a regional association of EduYears-PGS and the independent prediction of SES with cognitive function and brain development. It suggests that the SES inequalities, in particular parental education, are related to global aspects of cortical development, and exert a persistent influence on brain development during adolescence.

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Parental Education, Household Income, and Cortical Surface Area among 9–10 Years Old Children: Minorities’ Diminished Returns

Brain Sciences ◽

10.3390/brainsci10120956 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (12) ◽

pp. 956

Author(s):

Shervin Assari

Keyword(s):

Brain Development ◽

Surface Area ◽

Household Income ◽

Parental Education ◽

Cortical Surface ◽

Whole Brain ◽

White Children ◽

Cortical Surface Area ◽

American Children ◽

Parental Educational Attainment

Introduction: Although the effects of parental education and household income on children’s brain development are well established, less is known about possible variation in these effects across diverse racial and ethnic groups. According to the Minorities’ Diminished Returns (MDRs) phenomenon, due to structural racism, social stratification, and residential segregation, parental educational attainment and household income show weaker effects for non-White than White children. Purpose: Built on the MDRs framework and conceptualizing race as a social rather than a biological factor, this study explored racial and ethnic variation in the magnitude of the effects of parental education and household income on children’s whole-brain cortical surface area. Methods: For this cross-sectional study, we used baseline socioeconomic and structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI) data of the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. Our analytical sample was 10,262 American children between ages 9 and 10. The independent variables were parental education and household income. The primary outcome was the children’s whole-brain cortical surface area. Age, sex, and family marital status were covariates. Race and ethnicity were the moderators. We used mixed-effects regression models for data analysis as participants were nested within families and study sites. Results: High parental education and household income were associated with larger children’s whole-brain cortical surface area. The effects of high parental education and high household income on children’s whole-brain cortical surface area were modified by race. Compared to White children, Black children showed a diminished return of high parental education on the whole-brain cortical surface area when compared to White children. Asian American children showed weaker effects of household income on the whole-brain cortical surface area when compared to White children. We could not find differential associations between parental education and household income with the whole-brain cortical surface area, when compared to White children, for non-Hispanic and Hispanic children. Conclusions: The effects of parental educational attainment and household income on children’s whole-brain cortical surface area are weaker in non-White than White families. Although parental education and income contribute to children’s brain development, these effects are unequal across racial groups.

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Cognitive and brain development is independently influenced by socioeconomic status and polygenic scores for educational attainment

10.1101/866624 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Nicholas Judd ◽

Bruno Sauce ◽

John Wiedenhoeft ◽

Jeshua Tromp ◽

Bader Chaarani ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Educational Attainment ◽

Brain Development ◽

Surface Area ◽

Brain Structure ◽

Parental Education ◽

Genetic Factors ◽

Cortical Surface ◽

Cortical Surface Area ◽

Regional Association ◽

Polygenic Scores

AbstractGenetic factors and socioeconomic (SES) inequalities play a large role in educational attainment, and both have been associated with variations in brain structure and cognition. However, genetics and SES are correlated, and no prior study has assessed their neural associations independently. Here we used polygenic score for educational attainment (EduYears-PGS) as well as SES, in a longitudinal study of 551 adolescents, to tease apart genetic and environmental associations with brain development and cognition. Subjects received a structural MRI scan at ages 14 and 19. At both time-points, they performed three working memory (WM) tasks. SES and EduYears-PGS were correlated (r = 0.27) and had both common and independent associations with brain structure and cognition. Specifically, lower SES was related to less total cortical surface area and lower WM. EduYears-PGS was also related to total cortical surface area, but in addition had a regional association with surface area in the right parietal lobe, a region related to non-verbal cognitive functions, including mathematics, spatial cognition, and WM. SES, but not EduYears-PGS, was related to a change in total cortical surface area from age 14 to 19. This is the first study demonstrating a regional association of EduYears-PGS and the independent prediction of SES on cognitive function and brain development. It suggests that the SES inequalities, in particular parental education, are related to global aspects of cortical development, and exert a persistent influence on brain development during adolescence.Significance statementThe influence of socioeconomic (SES) inequalities on brain and cognitive development is a hotly debated topic. However, previous studies have not considered that genetic factors overlap with SES. Here we showed, for the first time, that SES and EduYears-PGS (a score from thousands of genetic markers for educational attainment) have independent associations with both cognition and global cortical surface area in adolescents. EduYears-PGS also had a localized association in the brain: the intraparietal sulcus, a region related to non-verbal intelligence. In contrast, SES had global, but not regional, associations, and these persisted throughout adolescence. This suggests that the influence of SES inequalities is widespread – a result that opposes the current paradigm and can help inform policies in education.

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Correlations between sleep disturbance and brain cortical morphometry in healthy children

Sleep Science and Practice ◽

10.1186/s41606-021-00068-0 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 5 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Xiaoxu Na ◽

Ting Li ◽

Linda J. Larson-Prior ◽

Caroline E. Baldwin ◽

Thomas M. Badger ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Brain Development ◽

Sleep Disturbance ◽

Surface Area ◽

Sleep Duration ◽

Cortical Surface ◽

Healthy Children ◽

Typically Developing ◽

Cortical Surface Area ◽

Significant Relationships ◽

Cortical Morphometry

Abstract Background While the importance of adequate sleep duration to normal brain development is well known, more studies are needed to characterize how undiagnosed sleep disturbance other than suboptimal sleep duration may impact brain development. In this study we aim to understand the relationships between sleep disturbance measures and cortical morphometry in typically-developing children without previous diagnoses of sleep pathology. Methods Healthy 8-year-old children (30 boys, 37 girls) without clinical diagnosis of sleep disorders were prospectively recruited for brain MRI and their parents completed the Children’s Sleep Habits Questionnaire (CSHQ). Total sleep disturbance score, as well as 8 subscales including bedtime resistance, sleep onset delay, sleep duration, sleep anxiety, night waking, parasomnias, sleep disordered breathing, and daytime sleepiness were calculated, and their relationships with cortical morphometry features including cortical gray matter volume, cortical thickness, and surface area were investigated, controlled for total cortical volume and sex. Results The CSHQ total sleep disturbance score significantly correlated with cortical surface area in a cluster in the left middle temporal gyrus (P < 0.001, R = -0.54). In addition, the bedtime resistance subscale negatively correlated with cortical surface area in a cluster in the right fusiform gyrus (P < 0.001, R = -0.50). No other clusters showed significant relationships between CSHQ total score or subscales and cortical features for this cohort. Conclusion Significant relationships between sleep disturbance scores in typically-developing children without clinical diagnosis of sleep pathology and their brain cortical surface area in two temporal lobe regions were identified, suggesting that undiagnosed sleep disturbance may potentially impact brain development even in healthy children.

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Joint analysis of area and thickness as a replacement for the analysis of cortical volume

10.1101/074666 ◽

2016 ◽

Author(s):

Anderson M. Winkler ◽

Douglas N. Greve ◽

Knut J. Bjuland ◽

Thomas E. Nichols ◽

Mert R. Sabuncu ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Surface Area ◽

Very Low Birth Weight ◽

Magnetic Resonance Images ◽

Brain Morphology ◽

Joint Analysis ◽

Equal Weight ◽

Analytic Method ◽

Cortical Surface ◽

Cortical Volume ◽

Cortical Surface Area

AbstractCortical surface area is an increasingly used brain morphology metric that is ontogenetically and phylogenetically distinct from cortical thickness and offers a separate index of neurodevelopment and disease. However, the various existing methods for assessment of cortical surface area from magnetic resonance images have never been systematically compared. We show that the surface area method implemented in FreeSurfer corresponds closely to the exact, but computationally more demanding, mass-conservative (pyc-nophylactic) method, provided that images are smoothed. Thus, the data produced by this method can be interpreted as estimates of cortical surface area, as opposed to areal expansion. In addition, focusing on the joint analysis of thickness and area, we compare an improved, analytic method for measuring cortical volume to a permutation based non-parametric combination (NPC) method. We use the methods to analyse area, thickness and volume in young adults born preterm with very low birth weight, and show that NPC analysis is a more sensitive option for studying joint effects on area and thickness, giving equal weight to variation in both of these two morphological features.

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